Öcsöd-Kováshalom and the Neolithic Ceramic Technological Tradition in Hungary

Abstract

The Early and Late Neolithic artefact assemblages of Öcsöd-Kováshalom represent 700 years of nearly continuous local development during the Neolithic period. This study focuses on the temporal dynamics of ceramic transformations, that occurred in different paces concerning the forms, forming techniques and decoration of vessels. Decoration, as a device of social communication, displayed great variability in space and time. Vessel forms, constrained partly by function, rather responded to periodically occurring regional trends. The technological system had been following new claims and challenges only partially; it preserved archaic elements that eventually contributed to the formation of the Late Neolithic Tisza Culture. The character of the examined ceramic material prohibits us from reconstructing entire chaînes opératoires. The samples offer a set of identified technological markers, that refer to several characteristics of the manufacturing process within the technological system, represented by the artefacts.